J A M E S

 

Church helped. It was a quiet hour in a world of increasing noise. The minister gave him a kind smile, and included Lilly on the prayer list. Yet, James was glad when the service was over and he hurried to get home. The bomb was still ticking; he heard it everywhere he went. When he pulled into the driveway there was no sign of the TV van that had been there when he left. But as soon as he got out of the car a young woman with a camera around her neck raced up to him.

“Mr. Wolf!”

“I have nothing to say—”

“It’s about Lilly—”

He kept his back to her as he stood on the stoop and unlocked…. The deadbolt didn’t click. He was sure he’d locked it when he left.

“Mr. Wolf I’m so sorry! They scared Lilly away.”

It was as if he’d arrived at the wrong house, in the wrong year, on the wrong planet. For a moment he wasn’t sure if he should push on inside, where Lilly would be watching TV, or give this too-young-to-be-a-real-reporter a moment to explain. She barreled on before he could choose.

“Lilly came out—no one thought she’d just take off running! I tried to get them to stop, she’s just a child. The crews didn’t come back, but neither did Lilly. I waited. To tell you. I’m sure they didn’t mean for this to happen.”

The words clucked and clattered in his head and James didn’t have time to sort it out in the presence of—was her hair naturally navy-blue? He passed through the safe gateway of his home, so determined to see his child—some version of her, small or tall—lazing on the sofa with a bowl of cereal that for a moment he actually saw her, and breathed a sigh of relief.

“Lilly. Thank God.” The navy-haired reporter had just been another kook. But then his daughter dissolved and there was nothing but the darkened house. “Lilly?”

He checked her room, his room, the bathroom, the office. When he got to the kitchen he couldn’t miss the note; it flashed like the hazard lights on his car and he knew he didn’t want to read it. But it signaled its urgency and, unsure what else to do, he plucked it out from between the salt and pepper shakers.

 

Dear Daddy,

I know everything that’s going on has been very hard for you. I’m sorry. I know you think the doctors can help me, but I really really really think they have no idea what they’re doing. I don’t want people messing around in my head. Plus, I think I have a better solution. Remember that poem from the book with the fables and nursery rhymes? I’m going to look for The Village of Wrong Things! Don’t freak out—I know what you’re thinking! I think it IS real! I am PROOF that weird things happen! Rain is coming with me, so you don’t have to worry that I’m alone. Sorry about taking your money. I will send you postcards from my travels. And when I find the village maybe you can come see me??? I’ll miss you Daddy. So much.

Love,

Your daughter, Lilly

 

James spun one way, then the other, unsure what to do first. Call Rain’s parents? Call the police? Go look for her? His heart hammered your fault, your fault but he didn’t have time to wallow in guilt. He raced for the front door, where the photographer was still standing.

“Where did she go? What time?”

The young woman pointed toward the school. “About an hour—”

“I need you to help me!”

She nodded, ready for his instructions. “I’m so sorry—”

“I’m calling the police.” He marched toward his car and she followed. “And I’ll drive around looking for her. Can you get this on the news? Tell them Lilly is missing?”

“Yes! Absolutely! I’m sorry, I thought she’d circle back when things calmed down. Maybe she still will.”

But James knew it wasn’t the reporters who had scared her off. Lilly ran away. And it was his fault. He knew it to the core of his fatherly soul: he bollixed it. He’d been avoiding her, because it was too painful to look at her. And she read his downcast eyes as rejection. As he backed out of the driveway the photographer was already on the phone, but he had one more instruction for her.

“Tell them she’s sick! Terribly sick. She needs to get to the hospital the minute she’s found.”

The color drained from the young woman’s face. “I’ll tell them.”

The back bumper scraped against the concrete as he accelerated into the street. He sped toward the school, slowing down only to see if Lilly and Rain were chatting on the swings—in case they’d changed their minds.

As he scanned the area he dialed nine-one-one. “I need to report a missing girl.”

They asked him questions. He told them about the note, the time she left, her age, and what she looked like. He told them she might be with another girl and neither of them had a cellphone. Never had he been more furious with himself. All the reasons he’d given for denying her a phone, and never had he contemplated its potential role in saving her life. It had been inconceivable that they’d ever need GPS to track her down. But here they were.

Suddenly he doubted everything he’d ever done as a parent, every rule he’d ever made, every fantasy he’d found comfort in. As if their magical dome, inflated with fatherly patience (not unlike her beach ball), would ever have been elastic enough to survive Lilly’s inevitable growth. His pathetic imagination had refused the possibility that Lilly would someday possess the ability—or will—to walk out the front door.

The police asked him to return home where they could talk with him further, and in case Lilly came back. But James knew his daughter wasn’t going to change her mind. She was on a mission, a foolhardy fantasy to find a place that existed only within the pages of a children’s book. James ever-so-didn’t want to go back to his empty house. He drove a little faster toward the main thoroughfare, heading for the bus station—Lilly’s likeliest escape route. Before disconnecting with the authorities he promised to come home soon, but first he needed to see if Lilly was downtown.

He scanned the pedestrians as he drove—hoping to see his daughter’s towering head—and called the Shens.

“Hey James,” Michelle said as she answered the phone.

“Are the girls there?”

“Rain’s here.”

“Is Lilly with her?”

“No, they were supposed to meet at the playground but Lilly didn’t show. What’s going on?”

“She ran away!” His voice rose in hysteria now that he was talking to a fellow parent, a friend. “They were supposed to go together!”

“What? Rain, come here!”

As he neared the bus station he slowed, peering into the huge windows to see if Lilly was in the waiting area. Over his phone he heard a heated discussion between Michelle and Rain. Sure enough, Rain knew about the plan, and had meant to accompany Lilly.

Now James realized that the press, indeed, were partly to blame. Lilly hadn’t made her rendezvous because the TV crews had chased her, and she’d either intentionally avoided leading them to her friend, or…. Or she’d gotten turned around and hadn’t been able to find her way back.

“I’ll call you later!” As he hung up he heard Michelle yelling his name, but he didn’t have time. He double-parked in front of the bus station, hazard-lights blinking the words from his daughter’s letter—sorry, proof, love—and raced inside to look for her.

As terrible as it was that she’d run away, it was a thousand times worse that Rain wasn’t with her.

His little Lilly was all alone.